Where Arranged Marriages Are Customary, Suicides
Grow More Common
[1] With her father sitting nearby, 16-year-old Jenan Merza struggled to explain why she was lying in bed
recovering from a gunshot wound. “I didn’t know the gun was loaded,” she said, resting under a red-and-gold
blanket in a stark room with a bare concrete floor. A couple of moments later, after her father left the room to
fix tea and coffee, she cried softly and admitted what really happened, how she had shot herself in the
abdomen with her brother’s Glock pistol after first trying with a Kalashnikov rifle — a weapon too long to point
at herself and pull the trigger. “I tried to kill myself,” she said. “I didn’t want to get married. I was forced to get
engaged.” In this desolate and tradition-bound community in the northwest corner of Iraq, at the foot of a
mountain range bordering Syria, Ms. Merza’s reaction to the ancient custom of arranged marriage is becoming
more common.

▷문장분석
⑴부대상황
As the national economy were faltering, job seekers found it more difficult to lead a normal life.
Amid growing signs of social unrest, a military leader will go there.
With her father sitting nearby, she struggled to explain why she was lying in bed

⑵주어에 두 개의 동사가 걸릴 때
“I didn’t know the gun was loaded,” she said, resting under a red-and-gold blanket.
She cried softly and admitted what really happened, making her father embarrassed.
⑶with / at
He tried to realize his ambition with shoddy economic structures.
Even a single missile must not be launched at defenseless people.
The teacher patted her on the back.
She had shot herself in the abdomen.
North Korean defectors cannot explain their misfortune, what they have gone through so far.

Officials are alarmed by what they describe as a worsening epidemic of suicides, particularly among young
women tormented by being forced to marry too young, someone they do not love. While reliable statistics on
anything are hard to come by in Iraq, officials say there have been as many as 50 suicides this year in this city
of 350,000 — at least double the rate in the United States — compared with 80 all of last year. The most
common methods among women are self-immolation and gunshots. Among the many explanations given, like
poverty and madness, one is offered most frequently: access to the Internet and to satellite television, which
came after the start of the war. This has given young women glimpses of a better life, unencumbered by the
traditions that have constricted women for centuries to a life of obedience and child-rearing, one devoid of
romance.

▷문장분석
⑷describe A as B / be forced to~
Please, tell me what you have in your mind.
Officials are alarmed by what they describe as a worsening epidemic of suicides.
prostitutes (who are ) harassed by human traffickers / the policy (which, that) he proposed
I tried to rescue women tormented by being forced to marry someone they do not love.

⑸compared with / in comparison with
Any explanation can bring about misfortune in such miserable situations.
Reliable statistics on anything are hard to come by in Iraq
This is two times as long as that.
This is twice the length of that.
There have been as many as 50 suicides this year in this city of 350,000 — at least double the rate in the
United States — compared with 80 all of last year.

⑹constrict A to B / limit A to B
I don’t know why she is suffering from a social restriction, one influenced by the nation’s tradition.
the traditions that have constricted women for centuries to a life of obedience and child-rearing, one devoid of
romance.

[2] “The society had been closed, and now it is open to the rest of the world,” said Kheri Shingli, an official in a
local political party and a writer and journalist. “They feel they are not living their life well compared to the rest
of the world.” Last year the International Organization for Migration conducted a study on the growing suicide
problem in Sinjar, where mental health services do not exist, and concluded that “the marginalization of
women and the view of the woman’s role as peripheral contributed to the recent suicides.” A report compiled
this year by a researcher at a local health center concluded, “The way to solve this is to put an end to forced
marriages.” That will probably not happen soon. In assigning blame for the rise in suicides, many people here
mentioned the Turkish soap opera “Forbidden Love.” A romantic drama of the upper class, it is a favorite
program of women here, and some people say it provides an unrealistic example of the lives that could be
available outside Sinjar. Ms. Merza said she watched the show, and she admitted, “I wish I had that life,” but
her anguish seems more basic. At 16, she wants to remain a child. “I want to stay with my mom and not go
back to my husband,” she said. Ms. Merza’s father, Barkat Hussein, interviewed later in private, said he was
aware that the shooting was not an accident. “We gave her to her cousin less than 20 days ago,” he said. “She
accepted him. Like anyone who gets married, she should be happy.” He said he would not force her to return to
her husband, who lives next door.

▷다음을 영어로 옮기시오.
An increasing tendency to seek news online is hardly unique to Malaysia. But here, it is not just technology
driving readers to news Web sites. It is also that — by design, and in contrast to countries like China, with its
infamous Great Firewall — in Malaysia the Internet operates outside the stringent laws that regulate the
traditional media. So while newspapers, radio and television can operate only with a government license and
books and films must be approved by censors, who insist that controls are necessary to avoid social problems
like inflaming religious sensitivities in this predominantly Muslim country, the Internet has remained largely
free of government interference. But now that disparity — between media restrictions so stringent that
Reporters Without Borders ranked Malaysia a low 141 out of 178 on its 2010 Press Freedom Index, and a
relatively unfettered Internet that allows citizens to easily circumvent those restrictions — has called into
question whether the censorship laws are worth upholding in the digital age.